awn, the besiegers made out a number of dark forms
crawling up from all sides. The Matabele were renewing the attack.

Those within had already laid their plans. There were two windows in
front and one behindhand at each of these two men were on guard.
Carefully aiming so as to rake the dark mass, they let go
simultaneously, then dived below the level of the sill, and not a
fraction of a moment too soon. A roar of red flame poured from the
darkness, both front and rear, and several bullets came humming in,
burying themselves in the opposite plaster, and filling the interior
with dust. The former tactics had been repeated--the storming party
advancing under cover of the fire of their supports. And immediately
upon the cessation of that fire, a mass of savages rose from the earth,
and, quick as lightning, hurled themselves upon the store.

Then those within had their hands full. The magazine rifles, playing
upon the advancing crowd, wrought fearful havoc at point-blank quarters,
and bodies, in the struggles of death or wounds, lay heaped up under the
windows. But the assailants paused not, pressing on with greater
intrepidity than ever, seeming to laugh at death. Now their hands were
on the window-sills, but before they could effect an entrance there was
the same crash, the same wild spring, the same fall backward without,
and mingling with the din of firearms, the unearthly vibration of the
Matabele battle-hum, uttered from the chest through the closed teeth
outward, "Jji-jji!" rendered the scene as one of the strivings of
fiends. Then the set, awful faces of those within--visible in the glare
and smoke of the rifles--battling for their lives against tremendous
odds!

It could not last. Very few minutes would decide one way or the other.
Carbutt, helping defend one of the front windows, found the magazine of
his rifle exhausted. Dropping back to fill it, he found his ammunition
in like state--exhausted too; and at the same time the man who stepped
forward to take his place received a blow with a heavy knobkerrie that
sent him down like a bullock. A big Matabele warrior was half in the
room; another, quick as thought, drove his assegai clean through the
Cockney prospector. The entrance was forced. The besiegers held
possession of the interior.

Not quite, though. The last man left alive, viz. Carbutt himself,
stepped back through the compartment door and slammed it in their faces.
But what avail? They